Some features that you might look for in choosing an E-Mail program are:
- Address Book - Most e-mail programs have an address book where you can store names and e-mail addresses of people you send -mail to often.
- Auto-responder - this feature allows you to send an automatic reply to people who send you e-mail. This is useful when you are on vacation or you have a mailbox set up just to send information back to the sender.
- Attachments - most programs allow you to send and receive files that you attach to your e-mail such as images, sounds or programs. large attachments can fill up your mail box in a hurry and can take a long time to download. They can also contain software that can damage your computer called viruses. So be careful about using attachments. Don't ever open an attachment from someone you don't know. It might even be a good idea to call them and ask what the attachment is before opening it.
- Clickable URL and e-mail addresses - some programs allow you to click or double-click on URLs in messages, which opens the URL in your browser, or click on e-mail addresses contained in messages, to open up a new e-mail window.
- Consolidation - some e-mail programs allow you to handle mail from several e-mail accounts in one convenient place.
- Custom signatures - most programs let you have one or more standard signatures that get automatically attached to the end of your e-mails
- Discussion list threading - a few programs allow you to manage discussion lists
- Draft Box - a place to store e-mail that is still in progress or not yet ready to send.
- Filters - this feature allows you to block e-mail from people you don't want to hear from including unsolicited advertisements called SPAM. You can also have mail automatically filed into folders.
- Folders - some programs allow you to store your e-mail in convenient folders that you set up to file your e-mail in (i.e., personal, work, mom, humor, etc.)
- Forwarding - All programs let you forward email to someone else. Some will automatically send email with a particular subject, on to another email address.
- Free trial offer - sometimes you can try out the software for a limited time before having to purchase it.
- Groups - Most e-mail programs allow you to set up groups of e-mail address to send e-mail to such as a group of co-workers or friends.
- HTML compatible - some browsers can display HTML, others only can display unformatted text. MIME HTML (MHTML) messages actually include graphics, Java applets, and other objects.
- Languages - some programs are available in several languages
- Multiple accounts - some programs will allow you to switch between several accounts
- Newsgroups - some e-mail programs let you read and write to newsgroups.
- Offline editing - most programs will let you write, store and file e-mail offline so you only need to be connected to the Internet when sending and receiving e-mail.
- Scheduling - some programs let you designate when an e-mail will be sent. This can be used to send reminders to yourself or others about meetings, etc. Many programs allow you to set up a connection schedule which allows your computer to check for e-mail on a regular basis.
- Spell checker - a few programs have spell checkers built into them.
- POP3, HTTP, IMAP4 & SMTP support - protocols for sending e-mail over the Internet.
Here are some good e-mail programs to check out:
- AK-Mail
- The Bat
- Becky
- Eudora
- Outlook 2007 - comes with MS Office
- Outlook Express - comes with Internet Explorer
- Mail for Mac OSX